The Reunion (2 page)

A
fter leaving Heather’s trailer, Aaron stopped by the office to brief Sue. She was a big woman, with long hair she mostly wore tied up. Aaron figured she’d spent the better part of her life as a brunette, but half her hair was gray now. She could be nice, if you caught her at just the right time and said things just the right way. She had just thanked him in a roundabout way for handling the situation and agreed this Ryan fellow was nothing but trouble.

“Had a bad feeling about him when they first came in here,” she said. “Should have gone with my hunches. Well, here . . .” She lifted a piece of paper toward him. “Here’s a job you can do just across the way from that trailer. That way you can keep an eye on it, in case the boyfriend comes back.”

Aaron read the note.
Replace rotting boards on wooden handicap ramp, Lot 28.

“You’ve met the fellow lives in there last week. Billy Ames. ’Bout your age.” She leaned forward and whispered the next part. “Got no legs, remember? Lost ’em in Vietnam.”

Aaron remembered. He had listened to Billy for a few minutes, then had to answer a call for an LP tank out front. He’d excused himself but kept thinking about Billy the whole rest of the day. Such sadness in his eyes. Not the normal kind, like you get from a bad day or something you wanted that didn’t happen. The kind of sadness that stacks up over many years. Billy seemed to mask it mostly by talking too much.

Sue leaned back and talked in normal tones. “Well, he called this in a few days ago, and I forgot all about it. He says that ramp is rotten in a few places. One place in particular creaks real loud every time he rolls that electronic scooter over it. He swears it’s going to collapse on him another time or two. He demanded I fix it soon or else he’ll sue. Imagine that. The guy’s renting a trailer from us, been here less than a month, and he’s threatening to sue us already? Anyway, why don’t you get over there and fix that next. That way you can keep your eye out on Lot 31.”

Billy Ames sat on his electric scooter all alone in this miserable trailer, staring at his gun.

At first, he thought he should do it in his bed, but then those poor paramedics would have to lift his dead weight up onto the gurney. This way, they could just drape a sheet over him and wheel him right out to the ambulance on his scooter.

He also worried about the noise, didn’t want the last sound he’d hear on earth to be a gunshot at full blast. He’d researched buying a silencer on the internet. Changed his mind when he realized no one would hear the gun go off, and his body might be stuck in that trailer for days.

No, he’d use a regular gun, but he thought of a way to muffle the noise. He’d wear a pair of headphones and listen to his Bob Dylan CD. Had it in the player right now. All he needed to do was push the button.

Then, work up the nerve to pull the trigger.

He was so ready to leave this life. He just wasn’t sure what he’d face on the other side, whether it was true what some church people said, that the Almighty didn’t take kindly to folks taking things into their own hands. What if he’d spend eternity in a worse place than where he was now?

But he couldn’t face it anymore. Nobody loved him, and he had no one to love. When he saw that handyman setting up Christmas decorations a little while ago, he knew . . . he couldn’t face another holiday season alone. He had to take his chances with the Almighty. Seemed like most of the religious TV shows he’d watched lately talked all about God’s love. Over and over again. If God did love him—which Billy found near impossible to believe—then God would know how sad and lonely Billy had been, for so many years now. He wouldn’t punish him forever just because he wanted to put an end to all his suffering.

Billy wouldn’t ask for much in heaven, knew he had no right to. They didn’t even need to let him through the pearly gates or walk those streets of gold. He’d be happy just to walk again. They could stick him as far away from folks who deserved to be there as they needed to. Maybe in a section for people like him who’d taken the same way out.

Billy looked down at the gun again. Then over to the CD player. It was time to push the button, let Bob Dylan start whaling away on that old guitar of his and moaning through one of Billy’s favorite tunes. He wasn’t sure which song would be the one yet. Maybe “Like a Rolling Stone.” Or maybe “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”; that might be a good one.

He smiled at the irony.

Just then, Billy heard a noise outside. He looked at the gun, then at the front door. Footsteps creaked up the wooden ramp, even louder in that one spot where the ramp was rotting. It scared Billy every time he’d roll over it on his scooter. Through the paper-thin walls of his trailer, he heard a man humming.

Three knocks.

He stayed put, didn’t make a sound.

Four more knocks.

“Say, Billy, you in there?”

Sounded like the handyman. Maybe they were finally sending him over to fix that ramp. The trailer park manager, Sue-something, had introduced them. His name was Aaron-something. Aaron was a Nam vet like him. Judging by the deep creases on his face, Billy decided that Aaron’s life may have been almost as hard as his.

Four more knocks. “Billy, it’s Aaron Miller. We met at the general store last week. I’m here to fix this ramp leading up to your front door. Don’t need to get in there. Just didn’t want to scare you when I start sawing and hammering away out here.”

Billy looked up at the door, saw Aaron peek in the window. He tensed up till he realized Aaron couldn’t see anything through the sheers.

“Okay, maybe you’re taking a nap. I’ll do what I came to do then. Sure that’ll wake you up. Maybe after, you could let me in for a soda. It’s not supposed to be hot in November, but I’m actually sweating.” He paused. “Felt bad running off after we met last week. Just the way this job is. Sue told me later you’re a Nam vet like me, said you told her that’s what put you in that chair. Just want to say, well . . . I’m here if you need someone to talk to. Us old farts need to stick together, you know? Well, I better get on this then.”

Billy heard Aaron getting set up outside. A few minutes later, he heard him whacking away at the old plywood ramp, prying the rotted boards from their hold. Now what was Billy going to do? He hadn’t planned on someone being right there when he pulled the trigger. It was just going to be him and Dylan.

He sighed as he put on the headphones, pushed the button on the CD player. Dylan couldn’t sing worth a nickel, but when he sang, Billy felt like he was listening to an old friend rocking on the porch. He sometimes wondered if he and Dylan might have been friends, if they’d had a chance to meet, get to know each other a bit.

Anyway, he preferred listening to Dylan far more than the racket Aaron Miller was making outside. So maybe Billy would just sit there then, listen to Dylan till Aaron finished. Let him come in for a cold drink, talk a little while. Probably wouldn’t stay more than a few minutes.

When the coast was clear, Billy could pick up where he’d left off.

T
he day was pretty much spent.

A two-hour job had taken the rest of the afternoon. Spending all that extra time with Billy Ames seemed like the right thing to do, but it left Aaron exhausted. The depth of sadness coming out of Billy frightened him. Aaron didn’t get at the core of it in their chat, but he didn’t have to think hard to come up with reasons why. Aaron had been that low in his life many times, and he had two good legs and things to do to keep busy all day.

Not good for man to be alone, he thought. Even the Bible said that. And it was never good for a man to feel he had no purpose, to just sit around all day, everyone else paying his way. By the sound of it, that pretty much summed up Billy’s life for decades. Aaron could understand a temptation to end it all if that were his lot.

That was the look he’d seen in Billy’s eyes.

He decided he’d better stop in on Billy at least once a day from now on, see if he could find a way to get him plugged in somewhere. Maybe hook him up with the local VFW or the folks down at his church. He’d seen a van pull up every Sunday with a hydraulic ramp for folks in wheelchairs.

Of course, it was clear the thing Billy needed most was a friend. It didn’t help that Billy talked so dang much, once he got going. One thing after another, like he’d been sitting on a mountain of words and Aaron had come in and set off the volcano.

Aaron headed back to the storage room. Figured he better put his golf cart back on the charger now in case that boyfriend came back tonight. He knew he couldn’t get over to Heather’s trailer half as fast on foot. He went inside and set his plastic crate on the workbench and set about recharging his tools. He was really tired and thought about how nice it would be to wash the day away in a cool shower. But all that time he’d spent with Billy set him back on a few chores he was supposed to get to today. Maybe he should get everything he needed out now, so he could get a head start on things for the morning.

As he reached up to grab a tray full of electrical caps, he nearly knocked his special box to the floor. He caught it just in time but banged his elbow on the workbench. “Ow,” he yelled. The pain was severe, almost caused him to drop the box again. He set it on the bench. “Don’t know why they call it a funny bone,” he said aloud. Nothing funny about it.

The box contained something he never talked about. To anyone. No one but him even knew what was inside. He didn’t know why he’d kept it all these years, but he couldn’t bring himself to throw it away. It was a plain gray metal box, about the size of a hardback book. After rubbing his elbow a few minutes, he carefully set the box back in its place.

He thought a moment. Maybe he should move it to a safer spot. Its contents had never touched the ground, not since the moment he’d received it back in 1970. He looked around the room. It was such a small space. There just weren’t any open places left to put it. Even the area under his cot was jammed with boxes.

He noticed the small picture frame, one shelf up from the metal box.
Yeah, that’ll work
. He picked the frame up and carefully set it on top of the metal box. He wasn’t likely to knock that over. And now he could see the picture better one shelf down. He paused a few moments. The picture in the frame had captured his attention. He picked it up and held it to the light.

It was his other prized possession.

These two things had been with Aaron through all the ups and downs these past forty years. The only two things he owned that he could say that about. He clung to them through the worst of it, even during his homeless years. The picture had faded a good bit and was even older than the contents of the metal box. It was a Polaroid photograph of his two kids, Karen and Steven, sent to him that last year in Vietnam by his wife Betty.

That Christmas Eve, swatting mosquitoes as rain poured down over his hooch, he’d held the picture for over an hour. One of the guys nearby had a radio playing all kinds of Christmas songs, one after the other. It was both wonderful and terribly sad. When this one song played, all the conversations within earshot of the radio suddenly stopped. Elvis Presley was singing “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” Tears had rolled down Aaron’s face when Elvis sang the last line of the chorus. The only way he or any of the guys could get home would be in their dreams.

Every year, Aaron repeated the same sad tradition. Wherever he was, he’d spend time on Christmas Eve holding that picture of Karen and Steven, listening to Elvis sing that song. His kids were just toddlers that first time; Karen was just a year old. They had to be in their early forties now.

Hard to imagine Karen and Steven in their forties.

He didn’t even know what they looked like now, hadn’t seen them since 1992, and then only from a distance. He’d sent them birthday cards for a few years after he and Betty had divorced. Never heard anything back from them, so he gave up. When he got off the streets and cleaned up in 1987, he tried to reconnect with them, gave Betty a call. She made it crystal clear. The kids would be better off if he just left them alone, for good. They had a new life now, a new dad. A big house, nice cars, a college fund. A real life.

Nothing like the horrible time he had put them through when he got back from the war.

He sighed, standing there looking at the picture. He’d messed it all up. Didn’t blame Betty for shutting him out all those years ago. Not after what he put her through. They were better off without him.

He carefully set the picture frame on top of his metal box, then thought about poor Heather sitting all alone in that trailer in Lot 31, afraid that jerk boyfriend of hers might come back any moment. Aaron thought it was entirely possible Karen or Steven might have children Heather’s age.

His grandchildren.

He liked to think if they did have kids Heather’s age, and they got in some kind of trouble, someone like him might be there to look after them. He decided he’d do whatever he could to help Heather out. No way he’d let that young man hurt her again. He’d get the police involved next time or else take care of things himself if he had to.

Just then, the walkie-talkie crackled to life. “Hey, Aaron, have you clocked out yet?”

He picked it up off the charger. “I’m in the storage room, Sue. Whatcha need?”